Book Launch: Mister Timeless Blyth
- 24 October 2023
- 6:00pm – 7:00pm
- Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation, 13 / 14 Cornwall Terrace, London NW1 4QP
- https://dajf.org.uk/event/mister-timeless-blythy
- +44 (0)20 7486 4348
- events@dajf.org.uk
- Tweet
Imprisoned as a conscientious objector during the first World War and interned as an enemy alien in Japan during the second, RH Blyth was a poet, a scholar, a musician, a linguist and a man of Zen who became a teacher to an emperor. Ultimately, he became the key link and mediator between the Japanese Imperial Household and the occupying American forces. He spent the better part of his lifetime building bridges between East and West and was an influence on a whole generation of American writers – Ginsberg, Salinger, Keroauc, Snyder – through his translations of Japanese haiku. He was, in many ways, a man who changed the world. Mister Timeless Blyth is his story.
Book Reviews:
– The Scotsman
– The Herald
About the contributors
Alan Spence
Alan Spence is an award-winning poet and playwright, novelist and short story writer. Awards include the McVitie Prize (Scottish Writer of the Year), Glasgow Herald People’s Prize, TMA Drama Award and Glenfiddich Spirit of Scotland Award. Books include Its Colours They Are Fine, Morning Glory and Glasgow Zen.
He is Professor Emeritus in Creative Writing at The University of Aberdeen, and from 2017 to 2021 he was Edinburgh Makar (Poet Laureate to the City). In 2018 he was awarded the Order of the Rising Sun from the Government of Japan. With his wife he runs the Sri Chinmoy Meditation Centre in Edinburgh.
He published two new poetry collections in 2022: Edinburgh Come All Ye, and thirteen ways of looking at tulips. His new novel, Mister Timeless Blyth, is published by Tuttle in the USA and Japan. Two of his previous novels, The Pure Land and Night Boat were also set in Japan. His work has been translated into 20 languages.
